The Way To Regeneration
by Kawaii Overdose
Summary: Shadow finds a strange stone and uses it for Chaos Control, but the stone took him farther from his home than he had ever been. Now on a dying world called Slyvarant, he must help the Chosen on a quest for regeneration, both for her home and for himself.


**Hello again! I wrote this story during my first year as a member of FanFiction (hence the story being written in my old method of narration), but I didn't want to post this or any other fiction until my first fanfiction, _Angel of the Twilight_, had been completed... _buuuut_ since I can't keep a promise I made to myself by putting _A.O.T.T._ on hiatus, and since FF put up that document life thingy, I post this now. This is for all you Tales Of Symphonia and/or Sonic fans who love crossovers and/or Shadow! Of course, I have no idea why I'm making Shadow the main character since I hate him...**

Shadow- WHAT?!

**...but who really cares about Shadow _anyway_! It'll have _ZELOS_! -hugs Zelos-**

Shadow- Let me get this straight: You hate me for who I am, but love Zelos for who he is?

**...Yeah, pretty much.**

Shadow- But Zelos is a pervert! And a traitor!

**Yeah, but he's _AWESOME_!**

Zelos- Dude, just live with that fact that you're a loser and get on with your life. Maybe then we'll accept you on a higer level of society.

Shadow- That makes no sense!

**It makes more sense than being so desperate to top Sonic you had to get your own video game, thus showing that you are, in fact, Faker Von FakeFake.**

Shadow- Well... that... -cries- YOU'RE MEAN! -runs away-

Zelos- Whiny brat.

**No kidding. Anywizzle, this fic isn't my top priority at the moment, so if you like it, please add it to your alert** **list.**

_Shadow and all related characters (c) to Sega/Sonic Team  
TOS Characters (c) to Namco/NamcoTales_

Enjoy!

* * *

Shadow the Hedgehog stood in front of the grave. Two years had passed since he was reawakened. Two years since he met Sonic and the others. Two years since the incident on Space Colony ARK. But it had been well over fifty since he lost Maria… 

"Maria…" the black hedgehog spoke to the tombstone. After the ARK fell, Shadow made it for her. "I know I was created for some important purpose. But…what? If you were here surely you would have the answer. Somehow, I don't think my entire reason for being is soley on this world."

He sighed and walked away from the cemetary. Nothing he could say or do would change things, and he knew it. Maria was gone, gone for good. And he was still here.

_'It's not fair…'_ Shadow thought as he walked down the streets of Station Square. _'Why should I still exist when the one who let me can't?'_ He seemed to have asked himself this many times. _'It really wasn't fair. Maria was an innocent life. She should have been spared.'_

He never lived that down. Maria was his first, and maybe his only friend, and he failed to protect her. He wished every waking day that he could have a second chance. Like that would happen.

"Agh, hell with it." he mumbled. He tried to clear his thoughts, but his ears twitched from the car sirens and loud noises of the city. Shadow ignored it as long as he could, but even his nerves are thinly threaded. "I need to Chaos Control somewhere quiet." he decided.

* * *

Shadow ran to the Mystic Ruins. _'Faker will probably be at foxboy's workshop.' _he thought. _'I'll just go in, take an Emerald, and no body will be the wiser.'_

As he ran up the steps to the workshop, something near the door sparkled and caught his eye. He walked over and picked up a deep blue stone. It wasn't any kind of Chaos Emerald, Shadow was sure of it. It was circular, and looked like it might fit on the top of his hand. He felt an great power coming from it, yet it felt somewhat warm and familiar. He shrugged and stepped away from the building. If he could feel energy coming from the stone, it had a power, and if the stone was powerful enough, he wouldn't need that Chaos Emerald. Shame. He wanted to torture Sonic a bit.

Regardless, he took it in the palm of his hand and yelled "CHAOS CONTROL!" Just as he had always done with an Emerald, he was gone.

After he left, Tails ran out. He looked around a few times and scratched his head. "Something wrong, lil' buddy?" said a voice from behind Tails.

"I don't know Sonic." he said. "I could've sworn I heard Shadow yell 'Chaos Control' just now."

Sonic got up to his friend. "Tails, you're being paranoid. You have all the Emeralds in your shop! If he took one, we would know."

Tails nodded. "Yeah, I guess you're right."

"Good. Now let's go back in so I can beat Amy at video games!" Sonic yelled.

"Sonic, I'm the one winning." came a femimine voice from inside. Sonic grunted something inaudible while he walked back in, and Tails took one last apprehensive look to the sky.

* * *

Shadow was successfully able to cause Chaos Control, but the stone was more powerful than he thought possible. It didn't feel quite the same with it than a Chaos Emerald. With an Emerald, he always knew that he was still in the confines of the world he lived in. This felt...different. Like he was leaving everything he knew behind. 

There was also the fact that Shadow remained concsious during a Chaos Control. Unfortunately with this stone, he soon blacked out before he reached his unknown destination.

* * *

_"What IS it?"_

Unknown voices started to wake Shadow up.

_"I dunno, Lloyd." That voice was higher pitched, but a male one. "Raine? Kratos?"_

_"Not in the least." came a deep male voice._

_"No, sorry Genis. I've never seen anything like it. __I wonder what the name of this creature is." said a female voice._

Shadow wanted to say 'I am the ultamite life-form' or 'I'm a hegdehog, genius' but no words came out of his mouth. His vision was blurred, too.

_"I like Poochie!" came a another female voice._

_"Colette, I think Raine meant what kinda animal it is." said the first voice. "And I'm pretty sure it's not a dog. A cat mabye, but not a dog."_

That grabbed Shadow's attention. No, not because the owner of the one voice called him 'Poochie' and that he had just been mistaken for a dog and a cat at the same time, but the female voice sounded so familiar, almost like...

"M-Maria...?" he moaned.

"I-it spoke!" stammered the voice known as 'Genis'. Shadow's groggy feeling was nearly gone and he started to stand up.

"And it's standing!" yelled the one called 'Lloyd'.

"Of course I can speak and stand." Shadow grunted. "By the way, I'm a hedgehog, genius." His vision slowly came back.

Standing before him, were humans. Not like he hadn't dealed with humans in the past, but these ones were different. One of then was a teenager with brown hair, wearing nearly nothing but red, with two swords at his sides. There was also an older man with equally brown hair, but wearing purple armor and wielding a dagger. There was a young boy with blue-ish white hair wearing blue, and holding what looked like a child's toy in his hand. There was an older woman with the same blue-ish hair wearing a brown cloak. Since she and the young boy looked so much alike, Shadow figured they were related.

Of course, he wasn't really paying attention to them. His eyes were on one human alone.

The last human in the group was a teenage girl with long blonde hair, blue eyes, and a friendly smile. She pratically looked like an angel due to how much white she was wearing. If it wasn't for her black pants, he might have thought he was dead and that girl was the Angel Of Death.(A/N: Ah, so close, yet so far!)

"Umm..." the girl named 'Colette' said. "Is there something on my face?" Shadow realized that he had been staring at her the whole time.

"No, not at all...you just remind me of someone, that's all..." he said.

"Are you looking for someone? Maria is her name, right?" Colette asked. "Maybe we could help you find her."

"That wouldn't be a good idea." said the man 'Kratos'. "We don't want to stray away from our objective."

Colette waved her hands in protest.(A/N: If you've played TOS you know what I mean)"But what's the point in regenerating the world if we can't help the..." She looked Shadow up and down a moment. "..._people _right in front of us?"

"Thanks for the offer." Shadow said. "But... that person is beyond searching for."

Colette realized what he meant and looked at Shadow sadly. "Oh... I'm so sorry." she said. She really seemed to mean it.

"Don't be sorry." Shadow said. "It's not like it was your fault, or anything. Nothing could be done about it."

Lloyd was shaking his fists. "No... something could have been done!" he said with anger. "Damn those Desians! It's unforgiveable how many lives they've taken for the sake of Exspheres!"

"The 'Desians'?" Shadow asked. Lloyd and the young boy, who Shadow figured was 'Genis', looked at him like he was crazy.

"You don't know who the Desians are!" Genis yelled. "Just how long have you lived in Sylvarant?"

"That depends: how long ago did you find me?" Shadow asked calmly.

"About 20 minutes ago." Lloyd answered.

"About 20 minutes, then."

"Alright, now I'm confused." Lloyd said scratching his head. "Professor, do you know what's going on?" He was talking to the blue-haired woman called 'Raine'. She had her back turned to them and was slightly shaking. "...Professor?" Lloyd asked again.

"She's got that look in her eye again..." Genis said nevously.

Suddenly, Raine perked her head up and shouted "What a discovery! An other-worldly animal, capable of talking, standing, everything and anything we can do, mabye more!" She turned to Shadow with an odd look of glee, that he didn't particulary like for some reason.

"I simply MUST disect it!" Raine cried.

_That_ must be why he didn't like it.

As if on instinct, Lloyd and Kratos held Raine back by her arms as she struggled to break free. Colette watched them with concern and Genis was groaning, lightly banging his head against a nearby tree.

"Does she... do this often?" Shadow asked Colette.

Her face went blank for a minute while she thought. She turned to Genis and asked "Does she, Genis?"

Genis put a hand to his head. "I've been trying really hard to hide it, too." he sighed.

By this time, Lloyd and Kratos were able to calm Raine down, who aplogized.

"Now then, who are the Desians?" Shadow continued. The question seemed to trouble everyone a little, but Kratos still explained.

"Desians are half-elves, along with some humans, who try to prevent the Chosen One form carrying out the world regeneration. They capture humans and put them in ranches so they can introduce their bodies to Exspheres, but no one is quite sure why." he said.

"And Exspheres are...?" Shadow asked again.

Kratos studied Shadow for a moment, then chuckled slightly. "Well, you _are_ wearing one. Don't you think you should know?"

Kratos gestured to Shadow's left hand. He looked at it and saw the blue stone he found earlier somehow encrested on his hand.

"What!" Shadow yelled. "Get it off!" Just as he started to try and tear off the stone, Lloyd stopped him.

"Don't! You could get really sick if you take that off! It could be fatal!"

Shadow was hesitant. Sure, his profile on ARK said he's immortal and everything, but he had no idea it was true. Rouge _had_ lied to him a bit about his past when he was reawakened. He wasn't really sure that any of what he thought he knew was the truth or not. Plain and simple, he didn't want to take the risk of death. Besides, being that reckless and stupid was Sonic's job.

"Why would I want this thing on me if it could severly hurt me?" Shadow asked.

"It can increase your natural ablities and you'll become more powerful!" Lloyd said in an 'as-matter-of-fact-ly' tone.

_'More powerful, eh?'_ Shadow thought with a slight tint of happiness. _'Maybe having this thing stuck on my hand won't be so terrible, after all.'_"One last thing." Shadow said. "Tell me about this 'Chosen One' and the world regeneration."

"Well, you see it goes like this-" Genis started to explain, but he was cut of by Lloyd.

"Genis, let me say it!" he pleaded like a little child.

"No! You fall asleep in class while standing AND holding buckets of water! For all we know you don't even know what the legend is!"

"Take that back Genis!" Lloyd yelled.

"And what if I don't?"

"Then I'll MAKE YOU!"

The argument started to evolve into a fight. Noo-gies and large pinches were seen, as well as a wedgie attempt. "I take it this is normal for them?" Shadow asked.

"Only until they've eaten." Raine said. "Just ignore them, I'll tell you the legend." Raine began reciting the old story passed through the generations in their world.

_**"Once upon a time, there exsisted a giant tree that was the source of all mana. **_

_**A war, however, caused this tree to wither and die, and a hero's life was sacrificed in order to take its place. **_

_**Grieving over the loss, the goddess disapeared unto the heavens. **_

_**The goddess left the angels with this edict: **_

_**'You must wake me, for if I should sleep, the world shall be destroyed.' **_

_**The angels bore, the Chosen one, who headed towards the tower that reached up unto the heavens. And that marked the beginning of the regeneration of the world."**_

"Who is the Chosen One?" Shadow asked.

Raine sighed and gestured Colette over. She pointed to a red stone, much like Shadow's, embedded on her choker. "This is the Cruxis Crystal." Raine said. "This stone is given to the Chosen One as proof that they can regenerate the world. This was given to Colette from her father, the angel Remiel. In short, the Chosen One... is Colette."

Lloyd, appearently forgetting completely about the fight and also that he was palming Genis' head, pitched in with the comments, not noticing that Genis fell to the ground. "That's right! Colette's the angel who's gonna regenerate the world!"

Colette blushed slightly. Despite knowing this since her birth, she still wasn't very used to so much recognition in one day. Shadow, on the other hand,was utterly shocked. How could a child so small and innocent possibly save an entire planet? Then he remembered how Maria saved him on the ARK. As far as he could tell, there wasn't much of a difference between her and Colette. Though, he doubted someone as important as her wouldn't be klutzy in anyway, like Maria was.

"Well, putting all that aside, I haven't properly introduced myself." Colette said. "I'm Colette Brunel! It's very nice to meet- WAAAHH!" As she tried to step closer to Shadow, she tripped and fell face first on the ground.

"Colette..." Lloyd groaned. He noticed a folded piece of paper that fell out of her pocket. He unfolded and studied it, a broad smile growing on his face. "Ah HA! See, Professor? I DID do my math homewok!" he exclaimed waving it in front of Raine's face. Raine aslo looked it over, positivley astonished that he did do his work. However, a devious smile played on her face.

"Lloyd, everything's wrong."

Lloyd 's smile remained on his face, but he started to cry.

"I swear Colette, you're a blessed klutz." Genis said. Colette giggled and Shadow helped her off the ground.

Mabye she and Maria were more alike than Shadow thought.

"Heh, I'm sorry." Colette said. Yet another similiarity. Maria always said sorry for things that weren't her fault. And here Colette aplogized because she tripped? It couldn't be helped. If you trip, you trip, that's all there is to it.

"You don't need to apologize." Shadow said. "You didn't do anything wrong."

"Thanks, I'm sorry... umm... I don't think you told us your name." Colette said.

Shadow thought about this. At first, he thought he shouldn't give his real name, just to be safe. These people could turn against him if they wanted to. They never even seen anything like him before and didn't know what he was capable of. Once they saw, they might regard him as a monster and try to destroy him. But Colette wouldn't let them do that. Something told Shadow that she trusted him right away and would understand the pain he went through in life. Colette _wanted_ to be his friend. And besides, these people did save him after all. He owed them something.

"Shadow. My name is Shadow." he said. If he lied, they'd probably figure it out at some point anyway.

"Well then, its very nice to meet you Shadow!" Colette said. She gently grabbed his hand and shook it, not afriad of him at all, which suprised him. There was usually a 10-foot distance between him and poeple around him (well, except for that one kid who mistook him for Sonic and asked for an autograph, but that is a different story)."If you like, you can come with us." she offered. "Lloyd? Are you ok with that?"

"Sure, I'm fine." Lloyd shrugged.

"Me too!" Genis said.

"I don't have a problem." Raine said.

Kratos studied Shadow a bit more. Finally he said, "I'm don't have any objections as well." Colette beamed and turned back to Shadow.

"So... would you like to come with us?" she asked.

Shadow thought about her kind offer (A/N: Gaah! Shadow thinks too much!) and said, "I don't really know this world, I don't have anywhere to stay, and I doubt any of the towns and cities would welcome me like you have.. I guess I'll come. ...But just as long as Ms.Raine here doesn't try to remove my internal organs."

This made Colette very happy. Lloyd and Genis were glad she was. Raine grimaced a little, but didn't look mad. And Kratos still kept his serious expression. "So, where were you going before you found me?"

Lloyd pointed to some large ruins out in the distance, surrounded by a forest. "That's the Balacruf Mausoleum." he said. "That's where the third seal is."

"You'll have to tell me about the seals too, you realize." Shadow said.

Lloyd looked confused. "Didn't we already?" he asked. He recived a smack on the back of his head from Raine.

"Honestly, how do expect to come on this journey with a memory span lower than of a rat's?" she scolded. Shadow chuckled. It reminded him of how Knuckles hit Sonic whenever he was called a knuckle-head. Seeing Sonic in any kind of pain was always amusing to him.

"Don't worry Shadow. I'll explain." Colette said. "But I think we should start walking to the ruins. By the time I'm done it'll probably be too dark to see."

"The Chosen is right." Kratos said. "It would not be wise to squander our time here." As the group started to trek over to the ruins, something crossed Shadow's mind.

"Hey, Colette." he asked. She seemed glad he used her name. "Have you ever heard of Sonic The Hedgehog?"

Colette blinked. "Who? Is he a friend of yours?" she asked.

Shadow seemed content with her answer. "Nevermind." he said with a smirk.

So... they never heard of Sonic The Hedgehog, huh? Shadow liked these people already.

**xXxEND CHAPTER ONExXx**

* * *

Shadow- -sniff sniff- 

**Oh, get over it will you? You always knew I was one of the few people on the planet who didn't like you.**

Shadow- Yeah, but I would never have figured you'd like someone like Zelos more...

**Yes you would have. You know I have an thing for guys with long red hair. That's why I like Knuckles more than you, too. And Axel from Kingdom Hearts (even though he killed Vexen(I'M NOT BITTER! -twitch-)), Reno from FFVII, and Renji from Bleach.**

Shadow- So? I have red highlights!

**Ugh... I didn't want to tell you this but... Shadow. I like SONIC more than you.**

Shadow- WHAT?! -cries again-

Knuckles- Zelos was right.

Axel- He is whiny.

Renji- It seemed kinda obvious from the beggining if you ask me...

Reno- I completely agree.


End file.
